As You Like It: Still a Comedy in Spite of the Unhappy Ending of Jacques - Essay Example

Theatre and Drama 120 April 13, 2009 Rough Draft of Final Research Paper “As You Like It” by Shakespeare is commonly to be characterized as a comedy. Princeton’s word web dictionary defines a comedy as “light and humorous drama with a happy ending.” Therefore, the most important aspect in a comedy is that every character of the work must receive happy ending. However, Jacques who is one of the characters of “As You Like It” receives an ending, which is generally deviated from range of happiness.

Nevertheless, people still define “As You Like It” as a comedy. This means that Jacques also gets a happy ending. The happy ending of Jacques is clearly different in this place from happiness what we usually think. In this regard, Shakespeare, Evans and Tobin comment on the role of Jacques, “Throughout “As You Like It”, Jacques has functioned less as the representative of a valid point of view than as a measure of the essential sanity and balance of the characters” (42). Therefore, “As You Like It” by Shakespeare is still a comedy, because Jacques is intended to be as a tool to represent relativity of values.

Firstly, it is remarkable that melancholic Jacques is showed as an observant to view the new world in the Arden Forest. He is the only cynic in the Arden Forest, where all other characters are happy and joyful. He spends most of his time showing hostility towards people. He shows typical melancholic behaviors such as crying after watching the injured deer or abusing the world. In Act 2, Scene1, Jacques says “Poor deer, thou makest a testament as worldlings do, giving thy sum of more to that which had too much.

” There is a possibility of seeing that these sentences liken Duke Frederick who expels previous duke to take his older brother’s territory. Rather it seems that Jacques is more comfortable with his cynic views about the people around him, which are in direct contrast with his depression and also his “miserable world” (Shakespeare Act 2, Scene 7). His depression appears not only from the futility of human life but also from the feebleness and the evilness of human nature. Jacques carefully keeps himself out of the happy group in the Forest of Arden.

As his function appears to be the sharp foil to the happiness of other characters, “inside the happy fantasyland of Arden, Jacques is a constant reminder that in the real world time is not suspended, and grief, sorrow and death provide a counterpoint to all human joys” (Study – world). Features of Jacques slandering the world and getting depressed make the appearance, which is relative with different nobilities being satisfied in Arden Forest.Secondly, Jacques divides a person’s life into the seven ages compared in the play.

As Harrison comments, “Jacques’ discussion highlights one of the major thematic elements in “As You Like It”: the concept of performance as personality” (1). For example, Jacques says, “…..Last scene of all, That ends this strange eventful history,Is second childishness and mere oblivion,Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything” (Shakespeare Act2, Scene 7).Here, Jacques describes about the last age of man in which, he receives a second version of his childhood and his senses are weakened due to aging.

However, features of Adam joined together right after are not like that. Adam follows bravely and assists his master, Orlando, even though his life is corresponded to seven ages. This shows the appearance of the life, which is relative according to the person. A person changes in life and covers the distance of seven ages according to his own personality. Adam’s personality is not like the personalities of other characters of the play. He is shown as a brave man and continues to be brave until the end of the play.

Thirdly, Jacques shows relative similarity towards the attitude of love. However, human life is a sum of all seven stages, the play “As You Like It” celebrates the stage of love between the couples comically. Indeed, Jacques also provides the audience with a new standpoint to view the lovers of the play other than the viewpoint from which the lovers see themselves. For example, Jacques says to the Orlando “The worst fault you have is to be in love” (Shakespeare Act 3, Scene 2).

However, Jacques also says that he even will do consultation to their wedding ceremony in the scene, in which Touchstone and Audrey fall in love. Also, in the conclusion he remains in the disinterested observant position keeping him away from the dance celebrating the marriages of the couples saying, “I am for other than for dancing measures” (Shakespeare Act 5, Scene 4).Consequently, a matter, which appears for the person who criticizes love inside this play considering seriously love with romance, can be also shown as one of relativity.

Finally, the highlights scene, which shows relativity of values of Jacques, is that he is excluded from the wedding scene, in which every character receives a happy ending. Jacques says, “To see no pastime I what you would have. I’ll stay to know at your abandon’d cave” (Shakespeare Act 5, Scene 4) and follows a reformed Duke Frederick. This scene also appears as I mentioned before that a happy ending of Jacques is relative with other character’s happy conclusions. If someone thinks that a happy ending is making a family with lover and living stably, Jacques thinks that a happy ending is wandering about from place to place with nature and living freely.

Unlike other characters, Jacques has his own perceived happy ending. For him, happiness is not in love and family but in living a life that is free from any kind of restriction. He is happy in his wandering life and needs no bondage such as wedding. While, the other characters find happiness in receiving love and in being attached with their beloveds.As the play’s title is “As You Like It”, therefore every character gets what he or she likes. Jacques is no less than other characters in obtaining what he wishes for.

He sees the negative values of the world and is contented in his perceptions and feelings. At the end of the play, Jacques is not willing to leave the forest like the other characters but he wants to be with the reformed Duke Fredrick and lead a life in monastery in order to learn something from the converts. Unlike other people, he has his own structured thoughts and melancholic behavior and he follows his own line of thoughts. He is not compelled to do anything beyond his liking. Therefore, he is not in the play to make the play away from the genre of comedy but to make sure that in comedy plays, people get what they wish and are happy at the end.

Jacques is happy with his own melancholic nature.Jacques cannot be considered as a harmful person as he gives no harm to anyone. He says what he feels but is not responsible for giving any harm to anyone. He is not characterized as a villainous character but one who is only concerned about his own melancholy. He criticizes openly without any fear. He is a straightforward character who hides nothing that comes to his mind. When the story develops following love story of Rosalind and Orlando, Jacques takes on a role as licorice root of a play with a unique character.

Especially for me, Jacques is more brought into relief than the main characters, Rosalind and Orlando since when I started to read the work. In my case, I usually have many times when I cannot say what I want, because of studying someone’s face. However, Jacques could keep on telling the hard truths without reserve and these relative behaviors draw my mind. Throughout the whole play, the significance of Jacques’s role is very weighty that he has been manipulated to work out the joyful environment around other characters as a foil to their happiness.

Jacques is an incredible character, which supports the significance and symbolic value of “As You Like It” despite its potential degradation caused by misinterpretation of this literary work. Jacques who can spoil a happy ending of characters also plays an important role as making a story with many meanings. It can be also called one of the ironies, and relativity of values. Jacques sees the whole world from a viewpoint that is very different from others, as Shakespeare, Evans and Tobin says in this regard, “the comedy is essentially serious, concerned to examine the nature of people, emotions and ideas…over generous in its attitudes and in its admission of the relativity of judgment” (42).

Therefore, Jacques’s character reminds the audience of the character as a tool to present the relativity of values, and in spite of the unhappy presence of Jacques, the play finally appears to be a comedy.